TIME-PIECE THURSDAYS: Disney Watches & Clocks

You'd be plane crazy not to like this watch...

The only trouble is the propeller doesn't go round quick enough to keep that crate airborne! No wonder Minnie looks so alarmed!

TIME-PIECE THURSDAYS: Disney Watches & Clocks

Much-worn and much-loved, it reminds me – every time I check the time – of a memorable visit to Walt Disney World...

GREATER POOHSPECTIVE

A short TV documentary on the new Disney Winnie the Pooh film in which I make a cameo appearance...

See also my posts on Mark Henn and Andreas Deja.

TIME-PIECE THURSDAYS: Disney Watches & Clocks

Let your conscience be your guide and keep an eye on the time...

SNOW WHITE AT RADIO CITY MUSIC HALL

Showplace: The Magazine of Radio City Music Hall Vol. 2, No. 3, January 20, 1938 featuring Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs...

Many thanks to Michael Goldberg for this addition to my Disneyana collection.

TIME-PIECE THURSDAYS: Disney Watches & Clocks

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs clock with an inscription to Brian Sibley from Adriana Caselotti, the voice of Snow White, dated 1988.

MARY POPPINS AND THE CAPTAIN

So, I was telling about how I wrote what might have been a film sequel to Mary Poppins...

Every now and again, during the process, there were stray conversations about who might play Barney – the ice-cream seller in the park who was to replace Bert as the leading male character in the film.

One such exchange was quintessentially ‘Hollywood’, by which I mean that it was so typical of Moviedom that it may easily have betokened a genuine cast-iron idea or nothing more than a wild and passing whim...

Anyway, this is what happened...

I'm taken to lunch by a Studio Executive at a ritzy restaurant on Rodeo Drive and, during the meal, I am suddenly confronted with a totally unexpected question:

“So," begins the Exec, "is it essential for Barney to be ‘Caucasian’?”

I look blank…

“I mean, does he have to be white?” he translates.

My failure to instantly respond is, of course, not because I don’t know the meaning of the word 'Caucasian', but simply because I can’t imagine why I am being asked…

For one thing, black people in Edwardian London were far and few between and whilst it was just possible, perhaps, to find a black footman serving in some big household,meeting a black ice-cream seller in a London park would have been an extremely unlikely occurrence.

And – apart from anything else – Barney is supposed to pass for Dick Van Dyke's younger brother!

Why do they want to know, I ask.

"Well,” comes the reply, “it just so happens that Michael is very keen to work with the Studio on a project..."

I interrupt: “Michael…?”

"Yes!" responds the Exec, as if dealing with a complete idiot, "Michael JACKSON! Having made Captain Eo for Disneyland, he's now a part of the Disney family..."

I can't help it – I laugh!

Exec is not amused. He becomes emphatic: "Look! He sings! He dances! He'd be PERFECT!"

I stop laughing: he's in earnest!

What's more, he's still enthusing: "Listen! Just think of the marquee-billing: JULIE ANDREWS -- MICHAEL JACKSON -- MARY POPPINS! It’s a BRILLIANT line-up --- AND a hands-down BOX-OFFICE CERT!"

As it turned out, Mary Poppins never did come back - not, at least, on film - but if she had, then it's anyone's guess whether we might also we have seen Captain Eo selling strawberry ices in Cherry Tree Lane…

TIME-PIECE THURSDAYS: Disney Watches & Clocks

"PHENOMENAL COSMIC POWERS! Itty-bitty living space!"

TIME-PIECE THURSDAYS: Disney Watches & Clocks

Where else but in Wonderland would you find a watch within a watch?

MARY POPPINS (NEARLY) COMES BACK!

 
This post takes up a story that I began a few weeks ago...

Of course, it all happened a long time ago: twenty-four years ago, to be precise, in 1987...

For several years, I'd been friends with P L Travers the author of the 'Mary Poppins' books and, over tea one Sunday afternoon, we were discussing the latest in a long line of requests from Disney that they be allowed to make a sequel to their hugely successful, multi-Oscar winning movie starring Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke.




This particular proposal was for a film in which the magical nanny would make a return visit to help the children of either the grown-up Jane or Michael Banks. It was a clever idea, reminiscent of J M Barrie’s idea of having Peter Pan come back to London in order to take Wendy’s daughter - another ‘Jane’ - off to Never Land.

For Pamela Travers, however, it was totally unacceptable, since she resolutely maintained that all she knew about her heroine was whatever was to be found in the published stories. It was pointless asking Pamela who Mary Poppins was or where she went and what she did when she left the Banks family. Her answer was always the same: “I don’t know! I didn’t invent Mary Poppins, I discovered her!”

Knowing that I would be incapable of changing the author’s mind about the Disney offer, I merely observed that there were a great many people who loved the original film and would be incredibly pleased to see Mary Poppins fly back into the cinema one more…

“Well,” said Pamela whose prickly views of the Disney film of her books were widely known (and which you have read on this blog), “I would only agree if I was to be completely involved in the process of making the film and if I could work with someone whom I could trust.”

Then, after a lengthy pause, she looked at me and said, “But if you want to suggest to Disney that you and I might work on a film story for them, then go ahead and see what they say…”

So I did!

I didn't believe for a moment that it would actually happen, but I wrote to Walt’s nephew, Roy E Disney whom I had met and interviewed several times, and then forgot all about it.

This was in the days before e-mail, so it took a week for my letter to reach the Mouse Factory. At the time I was living with my parents and returning home late one night, I was greeted by mother telling me that there had been a message for me to ring Disney. Assuming she meant the studio's London office, with whom I had lots of dealings, I replied that I'd call first thing in the morning.

"No," insisted my mother, "you have to ring the American office, now!"

"But who do I have to ring?" I asked, "there are thousands of people working there!"

My mother looked at me as if I was an idiot and simply said, "Mr Disney, of course!"

Within half an hour I was having a conversation with an enthusiastic Roy Disney and within a matter of weeks, Pamela Travers and I were contemplating starting work on the project.

Before we began, I suggested it would be a good idea if we watched the original film together and I arranged for a screening at the Disney office, then in London's Soho Square. There were just the two of us in the small viewing theatre and, as the lights went down, I asked Pamela when she had last seen the film? "At the premiere," she replied and my heart sank.


That was twenty-three years earlier: if she was critical of the film based on two-decade-old memories, what would her attitude be on seeing it again? Might this not deal a death-blow to the whole project?

Not so, as it happened. The film ran and Pamela kept up a running commentary with some predictable complaints but a great many positive observations.

"That's something we should incorporate..." she whispered.

"That's good!" she announced, "Let's find an idea that recalls that moment..."

"Use that song as a reprise," she instructed. "Make a note of it!" And I did!

Days later, Pamela Travers and I were hard at work, drafting an initial outline, following the approval of which we went on to produce the first of two developed treatments.

One afternoon, the pair of us and our mutual agent entertained Jeffrey Katzenberg who had flown into town for the premiere of Who Framed Roger Rabbit. It was winter and the electric fire in Pamela's front room was running at full throttle, pumping out heat and making the atmosphere heavy and sleepy.

I learned an important lesson about powerful people being just like the rest of us as I watched Mr K fighting jet-lag and the oppressive heat while Pamela laid down demands about a series of issues such as the requirement that Mary Poppins must not (as she did in the first film) display her undergarments!

By sometime in the middle of 1988, to my enormous astonishment, I found myself in Los Angeles writing a Hollywood screenplay for a film to be called (after the second book in the series) Mary Poppins Comes Back!

The story was to take place a little while after Mary Poppins' first visit. Mrs Banks had now given birth to twins, called (as in Travers’ books) John and Barbara, and during her pregnancy, had given up the cause of women's suffrage - an embellishment in the original film which Pamela had hated.

Mrs B was, nevertheless, as dizzy as ever, and not coping with her enlarged family; while Mr B was very wrapped up in his new position at the Bank and gravely concerned over problems resulting from various imprudent investments that had brought the bank to near ruin.

The children, predictably, were being fractious and troublesome...

One day, in the Park, Jane and Michael were having difficulty with their fly-away kite until - helped by Barney the Ice-Cream-Man - they finally managed to reel it in only to discover that holding on to the other end of the kite-string is the supercalifragilistic Miss Poppins!

Disney were hopeful that Julie Andrews might agree to reprise the title role - and, indeed, at that time she could easily have done that - but there were question-marks over the rest of the cast who were either grown up, too old or - er - dead!

When we began working on the project, P L Travers and I were expecting Bert to remain an important character - although Pamela was adamant that the romantic implications of the first film should not be repeated. However, in an early round of discussions with the Studio they suggested we look for an alternative character to act as "a pointer to Mary Poppins", which was PLT's phrase to describe Bert's function in the story.

We eventually decided to use the Ice-Cream Man, a minor character in the books, named him Barney and made him Bert's younger brother adding, by way of explanation, that Bert had gone on to "'igher things" and was now "sweepin' the chimblies of the rich and famous!"

Here – hitherto unseen – is the second outline on which the two versions of then screenplay I wrote were based...

Changes in personnel at the studio led to the project being reviewed and passed to the Howze sisters (Penny and Randy) who had written the screenplay for Disney's 1988 movie, Mystic Pizza. Pamela and I were retained as advisers but, eventually, after another two draft screenplays, the project was shelved.

One small, but significant, plot feature from our original story finally made its way (without acknowledgment, obviously!) into the script of the stage musical of Mary Poppins, so – in a humble kind of way – our efforts were not entirely in vain!

Check out some interesting videos about Mary Poppins on my Sibley blog posting Something About Mary.

MICKEY MONDAYS: Weekly Manifestations of the Mouse

Something to steady the nerves while standing in line for Big Thunder Mountain...

MICKEY MONDAYS: Weekly Manifestations of the Mouse

Engraved paperweight (limited signed and numbered edition) purchased at Disney Animation in Disney's California Adventure, Disneyland Resort, Anaheim, California.

MICKEY MONDAYS: Weekly Manifestations of the Mouse

To mark the fact that this 'Mickey Monday' falls on American Independence Day, here's Mr Mouse in his stars-and-stripes Uncle Sam costume, flying high over the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World in 1985...

The caption to this publicity photo reads:

MICKEY SOARS FOR STAR SPANGLED SUMMER -- Radio City Music Hall Rockettes will join Mickey Mouse and many other stars for Walt Disney World's summer-long Salute to America in Epcot Centre and the Magic Kingdom. Fireworks, parades and stage shows are among many special events. The Rockettes will join Mickey on stage at America Gardens in the World Showcase with the All-American College Symphony Orchestra and celebrity guest stars from June 8 to Aug. 15. (Copyright WALT DISNEY PRODUCTIONS, 1985) 61 38 10A

HAPPY 4th JULY!